Beyond the Mask

Plot

The film follows William Reynolds, a former assassin for the British East India Company. To redeem his past and earn the heart of the woman he loves, he must aid in the cause of the colonists during the American Revolution.

Cast

Production

The movie was partially funded by a 2011 Kickstarter campaign."

Releases

Burns Family Studios released Beyond the Mask in April 6, 2015 and after increasing demand and talks with movie theaters, Burns Family Studios reached an agreement with film distributor Gathr to release the films to 111 movie theaters nationwide on June 5, 2015.

The film was to be released on DVD on Tuesday, September 8, 2015 in 3,900 Walmart stores across the U.S., but some didn't receive copies until a few days later due to a distribution problem. The DVD was also available on Amazon, ChristianCinema.com, and its own website (beyondthemaskmovie.com), along with a "making-of" book, soundtrack CD (which had been released substantially earlier), and other promotional merchandise.

Reception

Beyond The Mask received many negative reviews, but largely positive reviews from the Christian community.

The review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes lists a 25% approval rating for the film, based on 12 major media reviewers (including the Los Angeles Times and Chicago Tribune). The Christian movie review site PluggedIn gave the film four out of five "Plugs" (Units for measuring family-friendliness). The Christian media site BreatheCast gave the film four stars, saying "The movie's fight choreography and period costuming are to be commended. With a slim budget of $4 million, Burns Family Productions manages to create a film that visually rivals many big budget movies of the same genre (such as 'The Count of Monte Cristo' and 'Zorro'.) Variety (magazine) gave the film a largely negative review, calling it a "a mostly stiff, infrequently stirring attempt to furnish a swashbuckling historical yarn for Christian audiences...onscreen mayhem...makes a pretty odd fit with Will’s spiritual journey." However, they positively reviewed the acting, calling the lead actors "likeable leads" and "Rhys Davies['s]...bellicose, two-dimensional villainy makes for undeniably enjoyable viewing."

The Hollywood Reporter gave a similar review, stating "Working with an obviously limited budget, director Burns does a reasonable job of re-creating the historical period with the aid of CGI and matte effects, although it was probably overreaching to depict Franklin's newfangled electricity as an incendiary tool. More problematically, the numerous action sequences are unconvincingly staged, with Reynolds at one point launching into martial arts moves that he presumably learned on a trip to the Far East. And while Rhys-Davies makes for an ever-reliable villain, the two leads are fatally bland, with Cheney lacking the charisma to make us care about his reformed character and Killmer achieving little more than looking exceedingly pretty." While Movieguide gave the film a largely positive review, it noted that Beyond The Mask is "a low quality movie. The storyline is a drawn out for no apparent reason. The graphics are television quality. Also, the hair and makeup aren’t well done." The LA Times called the film a "stagy, overstuffed costume drama" and "preachy," and complained of a "cut-and-paste script by Stephen Kendrick and Paul McCusker that manages to drag into the fray Benjamin Franklin (Alan Madlane), who dutifully proceeds to offer up a medley of his greatest quotes."